''News Free Zone'' was a 1985 Australian TV comedy show starring
Grahame Bond
Grahame John Bond AM (born 21 November 1943) is an Australian actor, writer, director, musician and composer, known primarily for his role as Aunty Jack.
Early career
Bond began his career in entertainment at University of Sydney in the 1960s ...
. It was the idea of
Maurice Murphy.
Premise
It was intended to be an entire evening's entertainment in one half hour with no news (shown at 6pm, the same time the three commercial networks showed their evening news). It screened daily.
The regular segments included:
*a sitcom called ''Australia Street'' about a sharehouse at 85 Australia Street with a different resident from each state
*a game show ''Neverending Story''
*a one person soap opera ''Party Line''
*''Kev Kevanagh's Kulture''
*''World Championship Acting''
*''Vintage Video'' which showed old sketches from
Aunty Jack
''The Aunty Jack Show'' was a Logie Award-winning Australian television comedy series that ran from 1972 to 1973. Produced by and broadcast on ABC-TV, the series attained an instant cult status that persists to the present day.
The lead chara ...
*a reading at the end from ''The Book Of Wisdom''
*Bond singing "Please Respect Me"
Cast
*
Grahame Bond
Grahame John Bond AM (born 21 November 1943) is an Australian actor, writer, director, musician and composer, known primarily for his role as Aunty Jack.
Early career
Bond began his career in entertainment at University of Sydney in the 1960s ...
as Kev Kevanagh
* Wendy Patching as Self
*
Rory O'Donoghue
Rory O'Donoghue (13 May 194913 December 2017) was an Australian actor, composer and musician, best known for playing the character "Thin Arthur" in the 1970s ABC Television sketch comedy series ''The Aunty Jack Show'', and for playing the guita ...
*
Garry McDonald
Garry George McDonald AO (born 30 October 1948) is an Australian actor, satirist and comedian. In a career spanning five decades he has had many theatre, television and film roles, and has been listed as a National Living Treasure. He is bes ...
*Robyn Moase
*
John Derum
John Bernard Derum (born 9 January 1946) is an Australian stage, film and television actor. He has also directed and produced for theatre companies throughout Australia and for television.
Career
Theatre
Derum walked in on Wal Cherry's ...
*
John Bluthal
John Bluthal (born Isaac Bluthal; 12 August 1929 – 15 November 2018) was a Polish-born Australian actor and comedian, noted for his six-decade career internationally in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. He started his career ...
*Jude Kuring
*Neil Redfern
*Val Langford
*Sandra MacGregor
*Doug Scroope
Production
Murphy says the program was based on his "absolute hatred of anything journalistic and philosophical" and an "absolute love of enjoyment and fun and the light side in life". He says it was based on his "personal attention span. Some programs have one minute of plot and 27 minutes of fill in. I've always wondered why we just didn't have the minute and forget about the other 27 minutes."
Apart from Grahame Bond, there are no well-known faces in the cast. "The aim is to try and develop a program that doesn't have to come off," said Murphy. "The idea is just to have I fun. I hope News Free Zone builds up new faces."
It was filmed in Adelaide. The series ran on every weekday for ten weeks.
Reception
The show was the lead-in for the new ABC news program ''The National''. Ratings were poor.
References
External links
*{{IMDb title, 0088581
''News Free Zone''at Nostalgia Central
1980s Australian comedy television series
1985 Australian television series debuts
1986 Australian television series endings